


Circular Motion

by cafecliche



Category: Ergo Proxy - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-19
Updated: 2009-12-19
Packaged: 2017-10-04 16:07:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/32026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cafecliche/pseuds/cafecliche
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After so many years, Vincent Law starts to notice patterns.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Circular Motion

Sixty-three times.

That's what Vincent Law's coworker at Autoreiv Control had said, anyway. The man had supposedly been some sort of mathematical genius, which must have served him well somewhere, but as an immigrant, there wasn't much use for it. But that particular day, bored of their usual discussion, their other coworkers began to pester the man about it. Did he go to school?

He shook his head to that. "Taught myself."

They let out a communal, impressed hum. But that must have been difficult, wasn't it?

"Not particularly." He'd shrugged. "Anyone could do it. I just got one of those books and did every problem sixty-three times each. And then I learned."

While the buzz among the men continued throughout their lunch break, Vincent was surprised to find himself holding back a snort. It was unbecoming of a fellow citizen, after all, to look down on another's hard work. But all the same, he thought, _After sixty-three times, anyone would remember that._

There were plenty of rules, plenty of procedures Vincent had repeated to himself since arriving in Romdeau. But memorization rarely lead to comprehension.

*

"Vince… are you lonely?"

It was the autoreiv's new favorite word. She'd been tossing it around, like a kitten with a ball of string, since they'd left the commune. It was the third time she'd asked him since burying their last remaining companion.

Of course, Vincent wasn't about to explain to her that things rarely changed within six minutes; that would be an uphill battle from the start. And he was hesitant to answer her in the first place. Talking to something that couldn't properly understand him, something seemed unhinged about that.

He answered anyway. "A little."

Pino's facial apps scrunched tightly, as if she was thinking hard. Finally, she seemed to come to a decision. "Does Vince want to play a game?"

It was about the last thing he was in the mood for, but he couldn't bring himself to snap at the girl – autoreiv – either. "Maybe later, Pino."

"Just a minute!" Pino dropped to the floor of the ship to grab her picture book, turning to a page towards the beginning and showing it to Vincent. "There!"

Vincent squinted down at the page: a young boy lay sprawled across unnaturally green grass in the illustration, and all the clouds he gazed up at had a specific shape. A cat. An apple. A car.

"Pino will find these," she declared, stretching herself across the deck of the ship in an imitation. "But Vince needs to look too, okay?"

Vincent glanced up obediently. There were no shapes. Each low-hanging cloud fused into the next in a hazy canopy.

"Ah!" Pino cried gleefully, pointing directly upwards. "A rabbit!"

*

"How long is this going to take?"

Amazing, how few words Re-l had to use to make him cringe. "I-It w-won't be very long," he stammered. The ability to speak clearly, he was sure he'd had it that morning. "I-It's just the rudder, so…"

"So?" Re-l prompted. "Don't just trail off and expect me to read your mind."

"I'll fix it, Miss Re-l!" Vincent choked, sinking even further.

"Vince, are we stuck?" Pino stood on her tiptoes to lean over his shoulder, mimicking his pinched expression.

"He's busy," Re-l snapped.

In a pitiful attempt to assuage Re-l's annoyance, Vincent turned to Pino, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Can you play without me for a little while, Pino?"

Pino stared at him, as if considering that, before turning on Re-l. "Does the scary lady want to play with me?"

"Can't you turn her chat functions off?" She didn't even look at Pino.

Vincent bit back a sigh. The woman he loved was a teenage girl, after all. Pino, for her part, pouted at Re-l before bouncing away.

Only seconds later, Vincent fervently wished that the autoreiv hadn't left. At least Pino couldn't distinguish awkwardness yet.

"S-So…" he began. "Miss Re-l, I—"

"I'm not interested," she interjected.

"… you don't know what I was going to say," he pointed out meekly.

"No." She shrugged. "But I'm not interested in small talk."

"Well… we're going to be together for a while, it seems!" He tried to inject a jaunty tone into the words. "So… wouldn't talking help?"

"Not at all," she said with conviction. "Not if we're going to repeat the same conversations over and over." When he looked up from what he was doing, clearly confused, she rolled her eyes. "Any given two people only have so much to say to each other. After a while, conversations just get repeated. I thought we'd bypass that tedium."

Vincent stared at the bent rudder thoughtfully. It wasn't as though he could counter that – not when the only one he'd talked to extensively was Pino. But he couldn't stop himself from blurting out, "Not exactly the same."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "What's this, now?"

"I mean…" He shifted uncomfortably. "Even if the words are the same… it changes somehow, right?"

Re-l didn't even dignify that with a response.

"Vince! Vince!" Pino jumped up and down from the other end of the deck, waving with one hand and pointing up with the other. "Look at that one!"

*

Returning to Romdeau was a much quieter process than leaving it. No bickering. No arguing. The atmosphere seemed too thick to fit words into, and they didn't try. Not until the afternoon where Pino learned what it meant to throw a tantrum.

Vincent lay on his back between the two girls, chuckling at how stiff Re-l seemed. Pino tugged on his sleeve, giggling. "What's that one look like, Vince?"

Vincent managed a smile. "A rabbit?"

"Yay!" Pino clung to his arm. "Vince is so smart!"

"I thought…" Re-l trailed off, almost unsure. "… that it looked like a mushroom."

Pino paused, squinting, before stage-whispering in Vincent's ear. "Re-l Re-l is really bad at this."

"I heard that."

It would be a long time before Pino learned the meaning of "subjectivity."

*

And as the sun cut the clouds into slivers, Vincent looked down at Pino, grinning. "Pino, don't you think that one looks like a rabbit?"

"No!" the girl said, without any hesitation. She waited for a long beat, as that unfamiliar, confident expression of Vincent's faded into a puzzled one, before glowing up at him. "It got smaller, so it's a bunny!"

Beside him, Vincent heard Re-l, choking on a sudden laugh.


End file.
